Choose Positive Living with Sara Troy and her guest Renzo Del Castillo, on air from March 12th

I want to focus on bridging the gaps between people, building connections and empathy through creation, art, integrity and love.

Originally, I had an abstract goal to publish a book before I turned 40. However, in the last 7 years I lost a significant number of my loved ones: my dad, my grandmother, my best friend’s mom, my cousins, my dog, etc. The relationship I thought was going to evolve into marriage broke down during this time. I felt life had stopped giving me things and had started to take them away, which makes absolutely no logical sense, but this is where I was at emotionally. Writing the poems that make up this book allowed me to process everything I was feeling during this time. This is why the book is called “Still;” I had to learn to be in the present moment and allow myself to feel and process whatever I needed to. Also, in Spanish, “still” means “todavia,” as in I’m still here. No matter what I’m still here and those that have moved on are with me in my memories and what they taught me. We’re here and this is our story and it means the world to me that anyone who reads this book will know them and love them too. 

Renzo Del Castillo was born in Lima, Peru, in 1983, and was educated at the University of Florida, leaving with a B.A. in English, specializing in Victorian Literature, and an M.A. in Mass Communications, specializing in Intercultural Communications. Renzo currently resides in Miami, but he prioritizes traveling in order to experience and be exposed to the tenets of other cultures. He strongly believes that it is through art that we find the divinity of truth, the pathway of communication with others; that through this connection we are made whole. While he has spent the last 15 years as an executive in the healthcare industry, Renzo has been previously published in literary publications such as Literary Yard, the Acentos Review, the Scarlet Leaf Review, and the Ekphrastic Review, as well as his debut poetry collection, Still. 

We left Peru when I was 5 because my family had received death threats from Shinning Path. We went from being upper middle class/ or lower upper class to starting from 0 here in the states. I saw my parents struggle to put food on the table to the point where they would tell my sister and I to eat dinner, that they had already eaten, when that was a lie because some days there wasn’t enough for all of us. That marked me. I was driven to make money because money equals safety. I went full Scarlett O’Hara: As god as my witness my family wouldn’t go hungry again, you know? Since we had limited financial means, my family gifted me with a thirst for knowledge and an appreciation of art, which was my escape. It was only in my early 30s that I achieved financial security, and that’s when I began to travel and my mind was blown and expanded by the different people and cultures I met. I saw that we weren’t that different across the world. Almost everyone I’ve interacted with wanted to love and beloved, to be under.

AMAZON

renzodelcastillo.com

erniagi23@gmail.com

instagram.com/elrenz

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